Ii6 READINGS IN RURAL ECONOMICS 



farmers. Thirty-seven per cent of the farmers in the United 

 States are renters. The average value of implements, machinery, 

 and live-stock on the rented farms in 1910 was $699. Part of this 

 is owned by the landlord. Sixty-two per cent of the farmers own 

 part of the land that they operate. The average value of land, 

 buildings, implements and machinery, and live-stock on these 

 farms was $6754. One third of these farms were mortgaged and 

 one sixth of them included some rented land. 



The average farmer is making interest on his capital and farm 

 wages for his labor. 1 The interest is not high enough to attract 

 any large amount of money out of the cities. The wages are not 

 high enough to cause any large number of men to move from city 

 to country, but they are high enough to keep most of the boys on 

 the farm. Probably enough of them are now staying, but the effect 

 of this will not be felt for a few years. Just now (19 14), we are 

 feeling the effect of the great exodus of boys during the nineties. 

 Now boys are studying agriculture and are staying on the farms. 

 They are responding to the increased prices by becoming farmers, 

 as their fathers are responding with increased crops. 



Probable future prices. We must not expect that the value of 

 farm products on the farm will drop much unless farming is again 

 overdone. The present conditions may result in too many boys 

 staying on the farm and in temporary overproduction. There will 

 also be overproduction of some products every year, as there has 

 always been. For example, thousands of tons of cabbages were 

 never harvested in 191 2 because the crop was so overproduced 

 that the price did not pay for hauling. Thousands of bushels of 

 onions were - stored in the fall of 191 2 and thrown away the 

 following spring because there was no market. The writer saw 

 2500 bushels rotting in one storage house in Ohio for want of a 

 market. But such conditions soon correct themselves. 



The prices in 191 3 were generally abnormally high because of 

 the excessive drought in the preceding summer. But any perma- 

 nent lowering of the prices of products on the farm must not be 

 expected, at least not unless everything else becomes cheaper. 

 Land now has a value, plant-food has a value. Every farmer 



1 U.S. Dept. Agr., Bureau of Plant Industry, Circular 132. 



